I just finished a whirlwind 3 weeks of fun travel – to QuiltCon in California, Craftsy in Colorado and teaching in Oregon. Now that it’s taken me a week to recover from my adventures I’m finally ready to share my QuiltCon experience with you. It was, in a word, Amazing!!

So far, I’ve been to every QuiltCon since it began in 2013, and I’ve been super lucky to get at least one quilt juried into the show each year. (This year I had two – see below.) I was fortunate to be invited to teach at two of the shows so far (2016 & 2017) and QuiltCon is one show I’ll continue to attend each year because it’s just THAT awesome!!

Color Weave was one of my quilts juried into QuiltCon for 2018. It’s made from 3 colors of precut strips with simple pieced blocks. The color placement creates a woven illusion.

Here I’m hamming it up with Modern Quilts Unlimited editor, Laurie Baker. It was fun to have my quilt Color Weave hang and get judged in the show. The pattern is from issue 21 of MQU. (You can even click here to download a bonus tutorial on how I did the quilting for this quilt.)

Judges comments for this quilt:

• Woven illusion is successful
• Treatment of pattern at top and left give breathing space and add interest
• Quilting compliments patchwork perfectly

Quilting detail of Color Weave – it was all done with straight lines using my walking foot. I used the piecing structure as a guideline for the quilting and varied the width of the lines using the edge of my foot and randomly changing my needle position.

This year at QuiltCon, it was kind of nice to have a break from teaching so that I could actually see the show, meet up with friends, and spend time networking with many of my quilting industry partners (like Hobbs, BERNINA, & Aurifil) along with the various shops who carry my books, patterns, and fabric).

I had a great time sharing machine quilting tips and tricks with folks who stopped by the Hobbs batting booth on the first day of the show on Friday. I talked the entire hour I was in their booth, so it was hard to get a picture of me without a funny expression on my face!

I loaned my “Spools” quilt from Piece and Quilt with Precuts to Hobbs for a few weeks so  they could use it to display in their booth at several quilt shows in which they are a vendor, including QuiltCon. Letting companies borrow my quilts for promotion is a win-win for both of us: they get to decorate their booths with colorful quilts, and my quilts get seen by a wider audience.

Above, clockwise: Squiggles from Piece and Quilt with Precuts, mini samples of patterns by Sylvia Schaefer of Flying Parrot Quilts, and a hand pieced, hand quilted block showing how Modern Marks plays well with other fabrics.

In-Town Quilters hosted me for a book signing in their booth on Friday of the show and I was pleased to see such a nice display of quilts and minis using Modern Marks fabric. It still makes me giddy when I see my fabric paired up with other designers’ patterns!!

I also did events for BERNINA and Modern Quilts Unlimited magazine on Saturday, but because I was so busy chatting – I forgot to take pictures. Needless to say, it fills my bucket when I get to chat with other quilters who love modern quilts as much as I do!

HST Remix was my other quilt that was juried into QuiltCon 2018. It was hanging in the overflow room which had great architecture and beautiful chandeliers.

Judges comments for this quilt:

• Fabric choices render pattern well
• Quilting patterns fill spaces well
• Area of gray in middle is really interesting element but feels slightly disproportionate

I actually appreciate the comments that offer constructive criticism even more than the positive ones, because that’s how I learn more about modern design. I’m still a fledgling student in this area and love learning all I can about what makes a successful modern quilt! In fact, each year I attend QuiltCon, it confirms my love for modern quilts and I’m always thinking about how to push myself to create more modern designs.

Quilting on HST Remix – this one is big enough that it now fits on our bed!

I’ve been attending QuiltCon since the beginning, and one thing that struck me this year was the variety of modern styles. I think quilters are really branching out, taking risks with their designs and doing a lot more experimenting. There were a good mix of solids and prints, bright and more muted tones, machine and handwork.

And I was pleased to see a lot more interesting free-motion quilting. Don’t get me wrong – I love geometric straight line quilting as much as anyone. But I’m glad to see that more quilters are embracing “modern free-motion” (perhaps after attending my classes and lectures for the last 2 years and realizing it’s ok to quilt swirls and feathers on their modern quilts?? LOL!!). I was also impressed with the quality of the workmanship.

To view most of the quilts that were at QuiltCon, be sure to check out the hashtag #QuiltCon on Instragram – or click here. Those little squares in the collage above mean that there were multiple images shared in the same post – tons of amazing eye candy!

To be sure, QuiltCon places more of an emphasis on design and originality than workmanship and I think that’s totally fine. I attend and teach at a lot of shows and while they are all unique, most other shows emphasize workmanship over original design. Again – nothing wrong with that either, it’s just a different point of view.

When QuiltCon first opened, I was worried that many quilters would be intimidated to enter because they had less quilting experience or couldn’t afford to pay for expensive professional long arm services to bling up their quilts.

But I was comforted by the fact that at that first show, and each show since, more and more quilters are actually doing all of their own work, from start to finish. It has been fun to see many of these newer quilters gain confidence and experience in their work, and just five years later you can see that their efforts have paid off.

Search #QuiltCon2018 on Instagram for even more fabulous inspiration!

One last thing to share: I served on the judging committee for QuiltCon – a volunteer position I’ve helped with over the last few years. No, I had nothing to do with this year’s judging or jurying. I just helped rewrite some of the policies so they’d be easy to understand for all who enter. One big change we made for 2018 was limiting the number of acceptances for any one person to 5 quilts and I think that was a great decision because created a more dynamic show that seemed fair to everyone.

I hope you enjoyed reading about my experience this year I and I truly hope you get a chance to attend in the future, if you haven’t already. QuiltCon will be in Nashville, Tennessee in 2019 and then back in Austin, Texas in 2020, where it all began. You can bet I’ll be there again for sure!!

Click here to view all of the winners from QuiltCon 2018.

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